Unit move not about cuts

Published: 10 September, 2010

• YOUR article, Eating disorder unit faces axe under plans to centralise care (September 3), may have given readers the impression that the proposed relocation of the Russell Unit from King’s Cross to a new specialist hub at St Ann’s Hospital was a cost-cutting measure.

This is not the case.

Our proposal is not about saving money and there has been no cut in overall funding for eating disorders services in Islington and Camden.

Compared with two or three years ago, we now see more people who are more acutely ill as a result of eating disorders, so we are planning to spend more money on inpatient care by increasing the number of beds by 20 per cent.

The Russell Unit is an outpatient-only service, whose current site in King’s Cross no longer meets the demands of the high-quality healthcare which we wish to offer, and does not offer sufficient access to the full range of treatment options recommended by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence. 

Our proposed specialist hub at St Ann’s will allow us to meet the demand for inpatient and outpatient care, with better co-ordination between the two.

Because inpatient care is proportionately more expensive than seeing people as outpatients, we have to make an equivalent saving to ensure that public money is spent wisely.

We want to maximise the range of services we offer, and have concluded we can best do so by providing inpatient and outpatient services on a single site while expanding our outreach services in Islington and Camden.

This will increase the specialist care available across the boroughs, rather than being confined to a single site.

Our consultation is open until November 7.

Full details are available at www.beh-mht.nhs.uk/get-involved.

MARIA KANE
Chief executive, Barnet, Enfield and Haringey Mental Health Trust